We know the routine by now when it comes to the main characters in Death in Paradise, notably the Detective in head of the police force on Saint Marie.
They come, solve a lot of cases while settling into island life, then something happens that causes them to depart the Caribbean (unless you’re Richard Poole, in which case he’s probably lounging on the beach, enjoying the sun in ghost form).
Humphrey Goodman’s (Kris Marshall’s) journey came to an end when he decided to follow his love and return to London to live with Martha (Sally Bretton).
Of course, because Jack Mooney (Ardal O’Hanlon) took over for Humphrey, we never found out if he was happy with Martha back in the UK.
Until now, that is.
Beyond Paradise, a new BBC One show, will follow Humphrey and Martha in the picturesque seaside hamlet of Shipton Abbot.
Humphrey will begin his new career at the police station, investigating crimes (not all of them are murders!) and doing his best to impress his new colleagues.
Tonight’s episode has Humphrey questioning a woman in the hospital who honestly believes a person from an antique painting pushed her from a ladder.
Apart from the policing component, Humphrey also has to deal with Martha’s mother, and his wife has big plans for her own restaurant.
While there are some parallels to Death in Paradise, it was an intriguing possibility to go into more intimate stories with Martha and Humphrey, as the crew behind the new programme were eager about what they’d be up to after leaving Saint Marie:
‘When we were thinking about who to bring back, it was always Humphrey and Martha who we kept coming back to and wondered what became of them’, Executive Producer Tim Key said recently.
‘Part of that is because Kris and Sally have such incredible chemistry that you just love watching them together. I think that is what drove this, wondering what became of the two characters and where they were at.
‘Kris only ever left Death in Paradise just because he had done five years being away from home, and it was time to move on to other things’, he added.
‘We would always talk to him about how we’d love to work with him again in some capacity and we got the chance with ITV’s Sanditon, but Humphrey was always at the front of our minds. That was a really good thing to go back and dig into.’
‘We didn’t want to just do a cynical spin off’, Creator Tony Jordan explained, reflecting on the differences between Death in Paradise and Beyond Paradise.
‘I think that’s doomed to failure, you have to do it with a bit of integrity and create a show that’s worthy of being on screen in its own right, not just as an add on to the main show. What we tried to do was take the DNA of Death in Paradise, what we think the audience loves the most about it and find a different way of delivering that.
‘Almost take the same ingredients but a different dish if you like. We know that location is an important thing, that sight and sense of beauty, fresh air, escapism, we needed to pick an incredibly beautiful part of the UK.
Source My Celebrity Life.